212 replies to this topic

[TheF1PERSON]

http://uk.eurosport....-shortcuts.html

Well, what do you think?

To me it seems like he's been playing a bit of Mario Kart.

[noikeee]

Senility is a bitch.

[Crazy Ninja]

http://uk.eurosport....-shortcuts.html

Well, what do you think?

To me it seems like he's been playing a bit of Mario Kart.

A load of bo***cks.

[highdownforce]

"I've tried to push the teams with a number of proposals. Imagine a shortcut which a driver can use five times every race. It would stop people getting stuck behind others. It would be good for TV"

[Aubwi]

Not much of a conversation starter, really. He's clearly losing his mind. Forgive me for trying to change the subject a little... How can F1 get rid of him?

[RodrigoL]

What is this? Formula Need For Speed? Someone get Bernie off the pills

[ensign14]

Pfft, it's been around for ages. Schumacher cut chicanes loads of times to ensure he was not overtaken.

[Hippo]

*sigh*
What's next? A tournament in competitive eating on Sunday mornings? Mental arithmetic knock-out on Thursdays? Singing contests?

Ridiculous....

[senna da silva]

Hamilton will not be allowed to cut the chicane. If he does this will result in the FIA handing out a post race 25s penalty to Lewis, even if he gave the position back.

[jeze]

What about removing all chicanes instead? Especially the stupid ones at Barcelona, Abu Dhabi and Singapore?

[Risil]

Rallycross has something a bit like this. It's kinda confusing.

[Bouncing Pink Ball]

Seems to me someone on this board was pushing a similar idea weeks ago; something about detours or split areas of the track. It's still beyond stupid (IMO, of course) but hey, why not? What's next, reverse grids? However, this quote gets me;

"Ecclestone, who laughed and joked with Alonso after a day's skiing..."

Er, so was Bernie skiing? If so, that's damned impressive at his age!

[Racing Dutchman]

Hamilton will not be allowed to cut the chicane. If he does this will result in the FIA handing out a post race 25s penalty to Lewis, even if he gave the position back.

Lewis has already used all his 2010 shortcuts in 2008 and 2009

Serious now:
The only one taking shortcuts should be the driver of the car driving Bernie to the mental clinic.

Off course this won't happen:
Poor people are crazy / demented, rich people are excentric

Edited by Racing Dutchman, 13 January 2010 - 19:54.

[Anssi]

I've been thinking about tar... spread it on the tarmac somewhere in the track...

I got this idea when washing my hair with tar shampoo

[senna da silva]

The headline should be:

Senile shortarse spitballs stupid shortcuts!

[pgj]

He has gone soft in the head.

We have had go faster buttons that did not work. Next he will be coming up with a stun button where once a lap you can press a button and take 20bhp off the car in front for five or ten seconds.

[pRy]

All we need now is a hex button!

[TheF1PERSON]

BTW, sorry about the spelling mistake in the title.

[thiscocks]

Jesus christ! He has finally lost it

[blacksheep79]

Bernie like this?

[One]

It like some police man in Dutch land tolerating the smoke in order to surface the dealing route. Well if this works is another question. For sure not for Chilac..

[olliek88]

*sigh*
What's next? A tournament in competitive eating on Sunday mornings? Mental arithmetic knock-out on Thursdays? Singing contests?

Ridiculous....

All of the above are insanely stupid, except singing, now there's a great idea!! can you imagine, And next up we have adrian sutil with his version of Wham' s Wake me up before you go go

[MadYarpen]

please somebody kill this guy. To weak to overtake? No problem, just cut some turn!

[Touchdown]

Come on, he has got to be taking the piss???

[jeze]

*sigh*
What's next? A tournament in competitive eating on Sunday mornings? Mental arithmetic knock-out on Thursdays? Singing contests?

Ridiculous....

Nah, some drink driving could mix things up. Kimi will then come back, and win with ease and LdM will uncork all wine bottles he has, cry in them and become and alcoholic. All drivers normaly 100 % sober will undoubtedly crash

[OnyxF1]

Excellent idea! While we are at it, can we give the drivers a selection of items to level the playing field? Banana peels, homing turtle shells and colourful magic mushrooms to increase engine power should do it.

[Slowinfastout]

Who cares about this senile nonsense... there's no way in hell they would adopt shortcuts.

You all should be worried about what will actually be changed next week to artificially 'spice up the show'.

Points for poles and fastest laps, pitstops for no reason, etc..

[Clatter]

I think I know who got MarioKart in their stocking for xmas.

[Tract1on]

Bernie, you genius!

[robracer]

Lol at those who think he was being serious. Bernie always says funny things to draw attention to the sport and himself.

[MadYarpen]

Who cares about this senile nonsense... there's no way in hell they would adopt shortcuts.

You all should be worried about what will actually be changed next week to artificially 'spice up the show'.

Points for poles and fastest laps, pitstops for no reason, etc..

gonna be messy

[OnyxF1]

Who cares about this senile nonsense... there's no way in hell they would adopt shortcuts.

You all should be worried about what will actually be changed next week to artificially 'spice up the show'.

Points for poles and fastest laps, pitstops for no reason, etc..

Meh, I gave up on FOTA/FIA doing something sensible ages ago. Anyway, it's not like they could make things any worse. Right?

[rolf123]

I think it shows how far down F1 has reached because his proposals, to be fair, would liven up some races.

Would you rather watch the borefest procession of Valencia with one to two seconds always between every car? Or see the odd shortcut being taken? It's the wrong way to go about it but it definitely would be good for TV, the old man is right.

I was pointing out in 96 how crap the overtaking situation was getting. 14 years later and we are no better off. And now this.

[LucaP]

where's my pitchfork when I need it?

[JPW]

Love the overreaction here, it's just "that time of the year" again where Bernie lobs in his (mad) ideas, sits back and sees how the whole F1 world and fans do their pavlovian response.

[johnap]

He's a rent-a-quote and a senile moron. The sooner he croaks it the better.

[JarnoA]

I actually think it is a good idea. My idea would be slightly different though, in that every track would have 2 routes that are theoretically identical in lap time, but you can choose which one to take. If you are stuck behind a slower car, you can take the risk of a different route.

Qualy would also be spiced up, with drivers deciding which route they prefer for maximum lap time.

[VicR]

Making Lewis' practice at Spa 2008 an option for every driver a couple of times in the races? Hmm...why not? That's fair.

[wingwalker]

I think ditching the speed limiter and making the cars go through the pits on each lap would make some awesome TV. Who's with me?

[Crazy Ninja]

I think ditching the speed limiter and making the cars go through the pits on each lap would make some awesome TV. Who's with me?

As long as the mechanics all wore their health and safety high vis vests!!

[Fox1]

I think it shows how far down F1 has reached because his proposals, to be fair, would liven up some races.

Would you rather watch the borefest procession of Valencia with one to two seconds always between every car? Or see the odd shortcut being taken? It's the wrong way to go about it but it definitely would be good for TV, the old man is right.

I was pointing out in 96 how crap the overtaking situation was getting. 14 years later and we are no better off. And now this.

First of all Bernie is nuts!!!

Secondly, many people reminisce about the "golden years" of F1, but the reality is that in the past we had borefests where the leader was in another timezone and the cars were separated by 10 to 15 seconds. Now we have grids where the top 10 are covered by .5 of a second and yet people expect passing to be easy. I know I'll be tarred a feathered for saying this, but I think it's unreasonable to expect cars that are virtually identical in performance to be able to pass each other with ease. The overtaking problem is part car, part track, part rules, and part audience expectations. IMO, something's got to give.

[D.M.N.]

Bernie's thinking along the lines of this:

No, really, what a beyond stupid idea.

[TheF1PERSON]

I think splits in the track would be a good idea, but the racing line would be tricky to join up again without crashes.

[Sophie]

I love this idea!


Sorry but this thread/story is stupid. Xxx

[Racing Dutchman]

It like some police man in Dutch land tolerating the smoke in order to surface the dealing route. Well if this works is another question. For sure not for Chilac..

Actually it is not the the policemen, it is our freaking government.

Trust me, that isn't their worst decision.

If Bernie ever wants to retire from F1 he is extremely suited for Dutch politics.

Bunch of clowns

[Kenaltgr]

This would turn F1 into Wacky Races. No driver will support this apart from Schumacher.

[Bloggsworth]

Perhaps we could also have an X crossover on the main straight so that cars can do one lap on the inside line then one on the outside line. Then, every 30 laps they could come in and change the brushes, after which the safety car could go round the track with a piece of sandpaper underneath to clean the contact strip. To add the unknown factor, at each race, one spectator would have the wildcard hand controller and start from pole position....

Edited by Bloggsworth, 13 January 2010 - 23:54.

[Mauseri]

Bianchimont proposes beheading for Bernie. Ok, bad joke, but that's about how seriously Bernies is messing with the sport. Just like his medal-system last year.

[Captain Tightpants]

Okay, Bernie's mad as a bus. I'm not denying that. But I find the best way to get rid of a madman is to humour him for a little bit before something shiny distracts him. So humour him I will:

First of all, the idea of a short cut isn’t going to work. I don’t see how you could reasonably enforce it, unless you’re intending to disqualify a driver uses it too often. And secondly, it would be a very cheap form of passing. Thirdly, what is there to stop the race leader taking the short cut for the first five laps and dialling out a huge lead? There would be drives who would feel obliged to follow, so the end result would be that you'd have two groups of cars separated by thirty seconds after just five laps - the kind of gap that a leader takes half a race to develop. Fourthly, it would just be confusing for everyone. Can you imagine Johnathan Legard trying to remember who is where? I can barely trust him to tell the difference between a Red Bull and a Toro Rosso (yes, I know they're the same colour - but a Red Bull is at the front, a Toro Rosso is at th back).

But there may be a solution, as wild as it sounds: a split circuit. Here’s the idea: I’ve been following you and I just can’t get past no matter what I try. As we come up to the split section, you go left and I go right. The split would be a mirror image of itself: exactly the same length, consisting of exactly the same layout. And they’d be fairly short. It becomes a race to see who can clear that section faster. They’d also be very close together so that the fans could see who was racing who the entire time.

The obvious downside is that the split section would have to be in the middle of a straight. You couldn’t stick it too close to an actual bend, because then one would have a better racing line and no-one would use the other. And there’s the obvious hazard of a divider sticking up in the middle of a circuit; I don’t want to imagine what would happen if someone hit it. Then again, you could get around that by having road markings so that the cars get split long before the actual barrier appears.

Of course, it would never take. People want to see passing actual passing that is a result of skill, not because a driver takes a shortcut.

[Slartibartfast]

Bernies' idea would certainly bring racing closer to the average person's experience of motoring. But I would suggest a few refinements:

1. The short-cuts must have 'traffic-calming' speed-bumps.
2. Any part of the circuit, including the short-cuts may be coned off for roadworks for 10 laps per race.
3. Entering the pit-lane will incur a congestion charge.
4. Stopping in a pit-box constitutes parking and must be paid for at the time via mobile phone.
5. Each lap, there will be a one-in-ten chance of the pit-lane becoming a red-route (no stopping allowed).
6. For half of each race the short-cut route must become a contra-flow.
7. The drivers will be informed of all changes via a 'sat-nav' in the cockpit. Which will always be 20 minutes late in updating.

That should bring about more overtaking, or at least cause more road-rage.